[DAM - What are people using?]

Wow! I started this thread in 2018 and it's still active. Since then things have changed...

I still would love to see Affinity develop a DAM solution. Since I'm only interested in DAM for photo images I tried many of the photo image focused products previously mentioned in this thread. ON1, Capture One, ACDSee and so on. I finally settled on Alien Skin Exposure 3 and am now on the most recent Exposure 5. Selling points for me are:

• No database; uses your folder structure (for me on a Mac) and side-cars
• Non-destructive editing of all the major photo formats, RAW, TIFF, JPEG, PSD
• Fairly fast on my aging 8 gig mem Mac
• Good image manipulation features
• Decent upgrades, updates, bug fixes, and good customer support
• Support for external editor (for me Affinity Photo)

I have about 3/4 tb of images. Not trying to sell Exposure 5 but it's worth a serious look... until Affinity comes out with it's own...

[DAM - What are people using?]

Thanks Przemyslaw. I looked at digiKam but it seemed to be a bit buggy. I'm Ok with spending money if the product is stable, well-supported, and at least seems like it will be around for a while. Thus far I've downloaded trial copies of ON1, Luminar, Photo Supreme, NeoFinder, and Capture One Media Pro.

I have a 2011 iMac so some people might have a different experience but here is my unscientific assessment of each product so far:

ON1 - Lots of promise but buggy, slow and sometimes freezes up. Poor transition between editing tools. Nice cataloging. Does not support APh files. Creates Photoshop files to handle layers (ugh!).

Luminar - Was supposed to add DAM by now but has not. Editing tools look nice but without DAM not of use to me. I already have good editing tool in APh.

Photo Supreme - Nice interface, slow catalog speed. Its cataloging right now. No editing tools. It does handle APh files and will launch APh. Supported by a large company has lots of users. Server and Single user versions. Promising. Need to work with it for a while.

NeoFinder - Clunky interface, fast catalog speed. I kinda like it but need to work with it more. Neo/finder also handles APh files and launches APh. Claims to be the only DAM that does a lot of things, handling APh for instance, but as previously stated Photo Supreme does as well.

Capture One Media Pro - Has all the features I want but it is truly a Pro product with a Pro price as well. I felt its RAW conversion was not as good as LR5.

There's a good possibility after trying these products and some others I might wind up staying with Adobe Lightroom. I'm opposed to the subscription plan and grate my teeth every time LR calls home. But it supports my workflow well, tools work well, and its reasonably performant. Sigh...

[DAM - What are people using?]

Thanks Rocketdrive. You might want to look at Photo Supreme (https://www.idimager.com/) for managing files. I've not done a deep dive on that product but its on the list. And I agree with you on all the points you made.

Update: My mistake Photo Supreme is only for images - it doesn't look like it handles the wide variety of files you use. NeoFinder (http://www.cdfinder.de/) might be worth a look.

[DAM - What are people using?]

Thank you el.gato

I should have added that I shoot only in RAW on both Canon and Nikon cameras, occasionally JPEG from other sources.

[DAM - What are people using?]

I'd love to see an Affinity DAM offering so add my voice to the chorus for one. But I know it takes a while to develop a good product so I'm asking what other people are using in the meantime. 

What I'm doing now is using LR5 on a Mac for DAM, color balance, and light weight retouching, and jumping right into Affinity Photo to do anything else. I have close to 1Tb of images and while I don't need immediate access to everything its nice to search metadata when I need to find an old image. Fast and accurate rendering, bulk metadata update, decent search are high up on the list of needs. 

So with all that in mind, what are other people using? Are you happy with what you're using and what other products have you tried?

Thanks in advance for all replies and suggestions. I did look for this topic but did not find a thread, so apologies if there is one and please let me know where it is.

[Introduce Yourself]

Hello All,

 

My name is Jon Revere and I've been involved with photography for over 42 years. Went digital when the Canon 10D came out and over time gave up the darkroom entirely. I've used Photoshop since v1.0 but I'm philosophically opposed to the software subscription model and was delighted to have discovered Affinity Photo this weekend. I've not purchased Photo as yet, only going through the tutorials to make sure I can do all the things I want to. So far I've been very pleased. When I get through the tutorials I anticipate becoming another very satisfied customer.

 

Purchased Photo and getting used to the tools. Right now I'm focusing on retraining my fingers after decades of Photoshop. Still liking what I see. 

[Introduce Yourself]

Hello All,

 

My name is Jon Revere and I've been involved with photography for over 42 years. Went digital when the Canon 10D came out and over time gave up the darkroom entirely. I've used Photoshop since v1.0 but I'm philosophically opposed to the software subscription model and was delighted to have discovered Affinity Photo this weekend. I've not purchased Photo as yet, only going through the tutorials to make sure I can do all the things I want to. So far I've been very pleased. When I get through the tutorials I anticipate becoming another very satisfied customer.